Teens caught after shooting pellets at girls getting off school bus

By CASEY MCNERTHNEY, P-I REPORTER

Published 10:00 pm, Tuesday, October 16, 2007

A group of high school boys apparently thought it would be fun to shoot students getting off a school bus Tuesday afternoon in North Bend. But police said their fun ended after a state patrol trooper held them at gunpoint, alarmed that they had randomly shot pellet guns at his daughter and her friend.

Through tears and screams, Merrill said, the 15-year-old girls described the Ford Explorer carrying four boys and two pellet guns. Police said the Explorer chased after the girls, continuing to shoot them as they ran to the house.

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Merrill said the concerned father jumped into his patrol car and chased the teens for about five miles.

"Before becoming a trooper, he was a Navy SEAL," Merrill said. "He was definitely the wrong guy to mess with."

As the teens fled south, they ran into a dead end near Rattlesnake Lake where the trooper held them until backup arrived.

Police said all four have criminal records, and three are upperclassmen students at Mount Si High School. One had recently been expelled for bringing a weapon to school.

"They're lucky they weren't shot and killed," Merrill said, noting a 13-year-old boy in Seattle was shot Sunday after a Seattle Police officer mistook his black cell phone for a gun. "And it's unbelievable that they thought shooting people would be fun."